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SUNY at Stony Brook Program
Stony Brook University Hospital Department of Pathology, HOS 2 Stony Brook, NY 11794-7530 Anatomic and Clinical Pathology Residency Program Director, Pathology Residency Training Program Sonya Hwang, M.D. University Hospital, Level 2 Phone: (631) 444-2224 Fax: (631) 444-3419 http://www.stonybrookmedicalcenter.org/pathology/residency 'Comment 1:' (Quoted from studentdoctor.net pathology forum. Posted by Fluble on 12-2-2010.)"SUNY Stony Brook - Program Review". Posted on studentdoctor.net pathology forum by Fluble on 12-2-2010. "I am a current path resident at Stony Brook. Here's my take- Basic information: Stony Brook University Medical Center has 12 AP/CP residency spots (generally 3 per year) and is establishing fellowship positions in Hematopathology and Surgical Pathology. Annually, there are about 20k surgical pathology specimens, about 4k-5k cytology specimens and 80-90 autopsies. All of the required rotations are at Stony Brook except for the forensics rotation at the Medical Examiner’s office (approximately 15-20 minutes west of the hospital). There are 8 attendings on the general surgical pathology rotation, and 4 of those 10 also sign out cytology cases. There are 9 other attendings that handle cases within various AP subspecialties (i.e. neuro, medical kidney, placenta, oral, derm etc.). There are 8 attendings that cover CP mainly and several other faculty members that mainly do research. Schedule: Year 1: In the past it was 10-12 months of general surgical pathology, but based on resident feedback, as of this year it has been reduced to 7-8 months in the first year. Year 2-4: Residents generally do about 4 to 5 months of cytology, 2 months at the medical examiner’s office, 18 months of CP and the other 11 months is pretty varied. Most residents do various surgical pathology subspecialty rotations, research months, etc. To give you an idea, most of our residents work 40-60 hours a week, with the variation due to different rotations and work ethic. Vacation time is generous…all state holidays plus 16 annual days/year. We also get 16 sick days a year. There are rules like if the 4th of July is on a Saturday you get a floating holiday day to use. As per the ACGME guidelines, residents are not supposed to take more than 4 weeks of vacation in a year. Call is taken at home and over the course of 4 years is essentially q12 (there are 12 residents) although sometimes it might be q4 and other weeks will be without call. Both AP and CP call are mild, maybe 50% of the time you will have to stay late to cover frozen sections and CP calls typically require 1-3 phone calls to handle. Residents rarely have to come in on Saturday or Sunday. The Surgical Pathology rotation operates on a 4 day cycle (3 first years + 1 PA). Day 1 (busy) – Gross/Frozens. The PA helps with frozens and grosses biopsies and many small specimens Day 2 (busy) – Preview biopsies, sign out biopsies Preview small cases, sign out small cases Preview large cases Gross if you had any leftovers Day 3 (medium) – Sign out large cases Day 4 (light) – Finish signing out large cases that required immunos, extra sections, etc. Work on presentations, research, reading. Location: Stony Brook is in Suffolk County, east of NYC. It is about 70 minutes from Manhattan by car, or 80 minutes by LIRR from the Ronkonkoma train station. There are many nice beaches on the south shore that are less than an hour drive away. Long Island- Upside: convenient, pleasant climate, great beaches and parks, excellent schools, diverse population. Downside: expensive, traffic. Advantages: Working conditions: Every resident has their own desk, computer, and microscope. There are spacious resident rooms that were renovated in 2009. The gross room and autopsy areas are above average compared with the 10+ programs I visited for interviews. Faculty: The attendings for the most part will spend a lot of time at the scope teaching you. They will all without hesitation go to the gross room to help you orient an unusual specimen or teach you how to gross it. They will push you to succeed as a pathologist and help you get started on research projects. We got a new chair over a year ago that has instituted many changes with the goal of improving the department and the residency program. Good salary/benefits: ~$53k to start with a ~$3-4k raise each year. Additional $800 annual book fund + Henry’s + a grossing text (i.e. Lester). If your abstract gets accepted, your travel expenses are covered to conferences. Parking costs ~$200/year, you get $25/month for food at the hospital. Specimen variety: Residents get extensive experience with bread and butter type of cases and above average exposure to uncommon cases. For example, there are 1-3 Whipples scheduled weekly, and in a typical grossing day, you will most likely come across at least one or two things you have never seen before. Research: Our department chair is an MD/PhD and provides ample support for resident research projects- basic science, translational, or clinical. I would say that about 25% of the residents do some type of bench research, but all are required to develop research projects. Careers: I would say that ~15-20% of graduates from the last 5 years have gone straight into private practice and the rest have done fellowships in various areas (FP, SP, GI, Cyto, Heme, Micro, BB, other SP subspecialty areas, Mol). The attendings are willing to go the extra mile to help you find a job/fellowship (calls to friends, etc). FP: The ME rotation is pretty well-received among residents here, even if (like me) they were not that psyched about FP going into it. There is about one resident every 2-3 years that pursues a Forensic Pathology fellowship. Disadvantages: In the past, my two major complaints were the need for AP fellowships and more dermpath specimens. They have addressed these two issues in the last 12 months-currently they are designing fellowships and they just hired a board certified dermatopathologist and have been getting more specimens. As the fellowships are a new addition, I do not have an idea exactly how they will be organized. The next thing that I would like to see improve is an increase in the Cytology workload. This has been an ongoing goal of the administration, but has not yet been realized. Autopsies - The number of hospital autopsies is relatively low (80-90 per year). This may increase after the recent hire of a new person in charge of decedents affairs. Regardless, residents have always finished with over 50 autopsies by the end without sharing, with an average I would guess somewhere between 55 and 60. I would say it is not easy for our residents to get a DP fellowship. Summary: At Stony Brook’s pathology residency program, you will get out what you put in. There is a small amount of scut. The attendings are solid and care. The first year can be a drain if you don’t like surgical pathology. Overall I like my job and am happy here." Hematopathology and Selective (Surgical) Pathology Fellowships Hematopathology Program Director: Yupo Ma, MD, PhD Basic Science Tower, Level 9 Stony Brook University Medical Center Phone: (631) 444-3000 Fax: (631) 444-3424 'Selective (Surgical) Pathology Program Director: ' Meenakshi Singh, MD University Hospital, Level 2 Stony Brook University Medical Center Phone: (631) 444-2221 Fax: (631) 444-3419 http://www.stonybrookmedicalcenter.org/pathology/clinfellowships References